Deer Farmer

billpie

Sam's club sells a 5# container of animal crackers for $5.98. Every time I walk out there with that jug all the deer come running to me. I think the key to giving a treat is about getting your deer close enough where you can get a good look at them. Animal crackers are a well liked cheap treat that brings them running to you.

SirChadwick

My deer love peanuts, apples and grapes. You stand at the front of the pen and hold up the bag of grapes in the air and shake it and they all come running.

Dogwood Whitetails

All great options! At the moment we're feeding carrots, peanuts, grapes, record rack golden deer nuggets and peanuts. Animal crackers every now and then. I feel like they look forward to treats a lot more than supper lol

billpie

All mentioned are good and I've done all, but did almost kill a buck with acidosis from too much corn. I get animal crackers from Sam's club, they sell a 5# box for $6.

Launchboss

i just lost a 10 pt that scored 196" by over feeding him corn.but some say the animal crackers and apples had to much sugar then the corn made a difference (asidosis) or corn toxicity i believe

Mstarcom

Horse treats. I have used the Purina Apple and Oat, Nicker Makers and Senior Berry. They are all around $15 for 15 lb bag and the deer like them all. The Apple and Oat are the largest biscuits, and the Berry are smallest. Berry are also nice to put in your pocket as they sluff off less powder when you handle them.

Manna Pro has two apple treats that are essentially the same thing, just a different shape. Saddle snacks are like a large piece of chalk. Apple Wafers is like two of those chalk pieces stuck together side by side. You get less fragments in the Apple Wafers. They also have a Peppermint Wafer that is the same shape. The Manna treats really should be called "bricks" instead of "Wafers" as they are very, very dense.

The Manna treats are cheapest, but the deer like the Purina better.

But their favorite treat by far is soft corn tortilla. You can get a stack of 80 for about $2.50 and they keep for a week or two without spoiling. You can also throw them like a frisbee to deliver them to specific deer.

Tagme

My deer and elk love carrots, parsnips, apples, the horse apple treats both by purina and sprout. My elk will eat pears & celery but my deer wont touch either of them. I smear peanut butter on trees in the pens. They love licking that gone. I've done peanuts & sunflower seeds. However what goes over like its the best in the world and even preferred over corn is raw soybeans. They absolutely LOVE soybeans. My elk enjoyed it in early summer but for the most part ignore it and love the corn more. I don't do much corn in general trying to avoid gut problems from it.
But if you can get from a farmer after harvest and bag the soybeans they will stomp over each other for it.
I toss scoops out, I don't normally leave in piles. I find they like to "graze" for it and that way no one can lord over a pile and they have to look for it like they would have to look for food if they were wild.
Fresh greens, branches with leaves in late spring and over the summer I do for them since in winter its not possible to do that up here.
Watermelon in the summer, pumpkins & squash in the fall.